An Illustration Using the RSVP

Stephen D. Hart, PhD

Rationale

The RSVP is a new set of structured professional judgment (SPJ) guidelines designed to facilitate comprehensive, treatment-oriented sexual violence risk assessments

It builds on other SPJ guidelines, such as the Sexual Violence Risk-20 (SVR-20)

Administration

Step 4

Basic Scenarios

Step 5

Strategies

Evaluative Research

Interrater Reliability

Interrater reliability of presence and relevance ratings for individual risk factors is good to excellent There is no difference in reliability for

ratings of presence and relevance of individual risk factors

Interrater reliability of domain and overall ratings is good to excellent

Interrater reliability of summary judgments is excellent

Concurrent Validity

Concurrent validity with respect to SPJs and ARAIs is good

Most strongly related to SVR-20 and SORAG, likely due to content overlap The common variance among instruments can

be accounted for in large part by psychopathy Various RSVP summary judgments have

different concurrent validities Case prioritization ratings are more strongly

related to actuarial scores than are other ratings

Predictive Validity

Sexual violence risk assessments made using the RSVP have moderate predictive validity Equivalent to that of SVR-20, ARAIs Similar to SPJs and ARAIs in past research

Future Research

Scenarios

How do evaluators develop scenarios? Talk-aloud analysis to examine case information, risk

factors, and implicit theories used by evaluators What is the nature of the scenarios generated?

Content analysis to examine numbers, details, distinctiveness

What is the interrater reliability of scenarios of future sexual violence? Evaluate similarity of scenarios between raters/within

cases versus between raters/between cases

Management Strategies

How do evaluators develop plans? Talk-aloud analysis to examine case information,

risk factors, and implicit theories used by evaluators

What is the nature of the plans generated? Content analysis to examine numbers, details,

distinctiveness What is the interrater reliability of strategies?

Evaluate similarity of plans between raters/within cases versus between raters/between cases

Efficacy

Do scenarios and plans influence improve case management? RCT to evaluate improvements in service

delivery and violence prevention

Correspondence

Stephen D. Hart, PhDPsychology DepartmentSimon Fraser University8888 University DriveBurnaby, BCCanada V5A 1S6 E-mail: hart@sfu.ca